Bespin Guard (Cloud City Security) - POTJ - Basic

The blue-clad Bespin guards commonly known as "Wing Guards" are the law enforcement officers of Cloud City. Under the supervison of Baron Administrator Lando Calrissian, they protect the floating metropolis from criminals and Imperial forces.

Crap. So close but no cigar. That’s about sums up how we feel about the Bespin Guard (Cloud City Security) figure from the Power Of The Jedi line. The first basic modern interpretation of the character, Hasbro decided to not update either of the vintage Kenner figures and instead develop yet another character from a different nationality than the figures from 1980 and 1982. That’s all fine and dandy. But it’s what they DIDN’T do to the figure that has us somewhat disappointed. Don’t get us wrong, we are indeed fond of this action figure, but Hasbro got a little bit sloppy with their decisions and didn’t replicate all of the important details perfectly. We will itemize them shortly. But this time Hasbro brings us a Bespin Wing Guard of Asian descent, a character that is very much in the background. In fact, every scene that we found him in was blurry. We couldn’t find a good facial shot of the character until we rooted through some behind the scenes production stills, in black and white no less. He is absolutely visible in The Empire Strikes Back. He stands behind Lobot as Lando confronts Han Solo on the Cloud City landing platform. But the shot is blurry and we haven’t noticed him in any other scenes after that. (That doesn’t mean he isn’t more visible in other scenes. It means we missed it.)

So what’s so bad about getting a relatively well-sculpted action figure of a character that hasn’t been released as a basic figure since 1982? Well, there are a couple of things. Firstly, while we love the removable cap, it’s huge and looks silly on the figure. It may have been wiser for Hasbro to sculpt a helmet on the head as a permanent fixture, so that the scale of it wouldn’t be compromised. Don’t get us wrong. Removable hats are wonderful, but only if they look authentic. Here it looks out of balance and ultimately hurts the figure’s aesthetics. Secondly, and we’re not sure why Hasbro would ever have decided that this was wise, they sculpted the figure with his jacket open. What gives? The Cloud City Wing Guards may be the most tightly groomed and dressed characters in the Original Trilogy. It looks like Bespin Guard (Cloud City Security) woke up late for work and didn’t have a chance to button his jacket. It looks wonky. It looks awkward. And it’s not an authentic appearance for these characters. These are two big issues for us, yet we still feel the figure has merit. We’re disappointed with the figure’s issues, but it’s still hard to “hate” this action figure. We’ll tell you why this is true.

The rest of Bespin Guard (Cloud City Security) has been tooled and sculpted so well. His close-fitting uniform is spot on and the details, like the gold piping and red accents look flawless. Had they just buttoned him up, we may have even been able to forgive the oversized cap. But man, that jacket is just wrong. What perhaps strikes us most incredible about this figure are its accessories. You know the cap is removable, but so is the shell of his jacket. He looks silly without it, but it’s removable in case you’re curious. But there are more accessories. He also comes with a baton, blaster pistol and a set of binders. Bespin Guard (Cloud City Security) comes with a functioning holster for the blaster pistol, but for the other accessories, cleverly, Hasbro drilled “inconspicuous” holes on the figure to attach these other accessories. This way, the figure can be fully accessorized and “hold” them all at the same time. We are impressed over this. As you can see, it’s hard to be mad at Hasbro over the issues this figure has because they made up for it in other ways. Also, Bespin Guard (Cloud City Security) looks fantastic next to other characters from Bespin in the Power Of The Jedi line, namely, Han Solo (Bespin Capture), Leia Organa (Bespin Escape) and of course Lando Calrissian (Bespin Escape).